Midwinter Sacrifice

Spartan, but not terrible. No mess of pizza boxes, no cigarette ends, no piles of rubbish. Loneliness kept neat and tidy.

In one of the living-room windows there were three small holes, taped over, with tape carefully placed across the cracks radiating from the holes.

‘Looks like someone’s been throwing stones at the windows,’ Zeke says.

‘Yes, looks like it.’

‘Do you think it means anything?’

‘There are lots of kids in places like this, and they’re always out playing. Maybe they just threw some gravel a bit too hard?’

‘Unless he had a secret admirer?’

‘Yeah, right, Zeke. We’ll have to get forensics to take a good look at that window, if they haven’t already done so,’ Malin says. ‘See if they can work out what made the holes.’

‘I’m surprised they didn’t take the pane with them,’ Zeke says. ‘But I dare say Johannison was here, and maybe she just didn’t feel like it.’

‘If Karin had been here, that glass would be in the lab by now,’ Malin says, heading towards a wardrobe in the alcove containing the bed.

Enormous gabardine trousers in various muted colours in a row, neatly hung up on hangers, washed, ironed.

‘This doesn’t make sense,’ Zeke says. ‘Everything’s neat, his clothes are washed, but he’s supposed to have smelled of dirt and urine.’

‘I know,’ Malin says. ‘But how do we know he actually did smell? Maybe he was just expected to? And then one person told another and so on, until it became accepted truth. Ball-Bengt, stinks of piss. Ball-Bengt, never washes.’

Zeke nods. ‘Unless someone’s been here since and cleaned.’

‘Forensics would have noticed.’

‘Are you sure?’

Malin rubs her forehead. ‘Well, I suppose it could be difficult to tell.’

‘And the neighbours? Didn’t any of them notice anything unusual?’

‘Not according to Edholm, who was in charge of the door-to-door.’

The last remnants of her headache are gone. Now there’s just the feeling of being a bit swollen and unwashed left, the feeling when the alcohol is on its way out of her body.

‘How long did Johannison say he’d been dead? Between sixteen and twenty hours? I suppose someone might have been here. Unless the dirt was just a myth.’

The hot chicken curry is on the stove, the smell of garlic, ginger and turmeric is spreading through the flat, and Malin is ravenously hungry.

Chopping, dicing, slicing. Frying and simmering.

The low-strength beer is poured. Nothing goes better with curry than beer.

Janne called a short while ago. Quarter past seven. They’re on their way. And now the sound of the key in the door and Malin goes out to meet them in the hall. Tove is oddly animated, as if she’s about to deliver a performance.

‘Mum, Mum! We watched five films this weekend. Five, and all but one of them were good.’

Janne is behind the lively Tove in the hall. Looking sheepish but still confident. When she’s with me I decide, and you know that. We had that discussion a long time ago.

‘What were they?’

‘They were all by Ingmar Bergman.’

So that was the plot, today’s version of the little acts they usually put on for her.

Malin can’t help laughing. ‘I see.’

‘And they were really good.’

Janne: ‘Are you making curry? Perfect in this weather.’

‘Okay, Tove. You think I’m going to fall for that! What films did you really see?’

‘We watched Wild Raspberries.’

‘Tove, it’s called Wild Strawberries. And you didn’t watch it.’

‘Okay. We saw Night of the Living Dead.’

What? Janne? Are you mad? Then her brain goes into reverse. Thinks: Living dead.

‘But we were down at the station as well,’ Janne says. ‘We did some weight-training.’

‘Weight-training?’

‘Yes, I wanted to try,’ Tove says. ‘I wanted to see why you think it’s so good.’